Dreams and Visions

The Simplicity of the Gospel

2Co 11:3 But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, so your thoughts should be corrupted from the simplicity( haplotēs- 1) singleness, simplicity, sincerity, mental honesty 1a) the virtue of one who is free from pretense and hypocrisy 2) not self seeking, openness of heart manifesting itself by generosity) due to Christ.

2Co 11:4 For if, indeed, the one coming proclaims another Jesus, whom we have not proclaimed, or if you receive another spirit, which you did not receive, or another gospel, which you never accepted, you might well endure these .
Is it possible that just as the bride of Adam was deceived by the serpent, that the bride of Christ is being deceived by that same serpent. Could it be as in Eve’s case that in her quest to become God Like and the Brides of Christ’s quest to become Christ Like that both have been deceived? The result was that the knowledge of Good & Evil , a knowledge that resulted in neither a knowledge of God nor did it make one God like. What it did was to enslave Adam & Eve into a system of rules, right and wrong, do’s and don’ts . The knowledge of Good and Evil does not give one life, it takes it away. To constantly be striving to do what is right and so win the Father’s approval is the very thing that Christ abolished on His cross. Gal 3:13 Christ redeemed us from that self-defeating, cursed life by absorbing it completely into himself. Do you remember the Scripture that says, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”? That is what happened when Jesus was nailed to the Cross: He became a curse, and at the same time dissolved the curse. Gal 5:14 For everything we know about God’s Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That’s an act of true freedom.
Gal 5:15 If you bite and ravage each other, watch out—in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then? (remember, Galatians is about a people who began in the Spirit but quickly got sucked into the bondage of good and evil. Biting and ravaging is the result of the attempt to attain right standing with God through obedience to the law and through good works.Eph 2:8 For it is by free grace (God’s unmerited favor) that you are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ’s salvation) through [your] faith. And this [salvation] is not of yourselves [of your own doing, it came not through your own striving], but it is the gift of God;
Eph 2:9 Not because of works [not the fulfillment of the Law’s demands], lest any man should boast. [It is not the result of what anyone can possibly do, so no one can pride himself in it or take glory to himself.] Eph 2:10 For we are His workmanship(poiēma-1) that which has been made
2) a work 2a) of the works of God as creator. Poiema is where we get our English word, “poem”, from. So, we are His poem.) , created in Christ Jesus to good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them.
This is not only a hindrance to our relationship with God but with one another.We condemn ourselves for not measuring up and we condemn others for not living up to our standards.This guilt that we lay upon ourselves and others does the opposite of what we want it to do in that it drives us further from God and not closer to Him. Where we are deceived is that we fail to grasp/accept/believe the fact that God’s love is unconditional. There is nothing we can do to earn it and nothing we can do to loose it.Rom 7:22 For I delight in the Law of God according to the inward man;
Rom 7:23 but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin being in my members.
Rom 7:24 O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? (we need to know that the answer to this question is Jesus and only Jesus. Paul realized that there was nothing he could do to change himself and that his only hope was Jesus.)
Rom 7:25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then with the mind I myself serve the Law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin. It is in the knowledge and security of God’s unconditional love for us that will ultimately change us and not our trying to earn it through works.)Rom 8:38 For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
Rom 8:39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Gal 5:16 My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God’s Spirit. Then you won’t feed the compulsions of selfishness